emtPA Posted June 29, 2015 Share Posted June 29, 2015 A few years ago I was put non-rehireable at a chain of hospitals in my city where I'm going to PA school. It happened basically because I was still fairly new to EPIC and I highlighted the name of a coworker/friend's chart to see what room they were in (because they had switched from ICU, to monitor, to ICU, and back and forth a bunch) and since EPIC pulls up the chart even when you single click on it, I got hosed for a HIPAA violation. I now need to do clinicals through the same group of hospitals and I am wondering how that might affect me. I have not said anything to anyone yet and I have been hoping that it simply will not come up. Also, I was told by someone who works in HR at another hospital that since I will be in completely different roles (CNA when I previously worked there) that it shouldn't be a problem for me to get a job there as a PA. Anyone have any experience with this? Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SHU-CH Posted June 29, 2015 Share Posted June 29, 2015 You should let your program know asap - they might need to contact the site and find you another placement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrator rev ronin Posted June 29, 2015 Administrator Share Posted June 29, 2015 EPIC's HIPAA enforcement stuff is ridiculously imprecise--I got dinged for the same thing for scheduling a family member with another provider. The fact that I didn't actually open the chart, just the scheduling screen did not seem to make a bit of difference to the enforcement folks.Thus, the second problem is the personality of the enforcement people--regardless of whether what you did was *actually wrong* or not, they love to threaten people with termination. In your case, though, it seems they were even more deaf and draconian. Having done actual internal corporate IT investigations leading to terminations and occasionally arrests, watching the slipshod way HIPAA enforcement is handled through EMRs seems to be universally abysmal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenmood Posted July 1, 2015 Share Posted July 1, 2015 I also have experienced the crazy side of EPIC's HIPAA chart tracking. When I was a PT aide I was helping with some performance improvement initiatives within my department. Part of that required me to click on the MRN of almost every patient seen by physical therapy. Well, obviously I was eventually going to click on someone with a sensitive story. My department head advocated for me and somehow made it go away. It was unpleasant. My workplace is transitioning from our home-grown EMR to EPIC in the next two years. I intend to be the voice of cautious clicking around here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
emtPA Posted July 4, 2015 Author Share Posted July 4, 2015 You're lucky you had someone fight for you. My manager was essentially a snake and had never liked me for no good reason. It was pretty funny that myself and one other got fired/quit over it and we were both friends with the individual. Yet RNs who were being malicious and looking at their chart to make fun of their medication list and weren't even involved in the individual's care didn't even get a slap on the wrist. I'm honestly not surprised that others out there have had similar bogus issues. I'm going to try making an anonymous call about the clinicals and see what the organization says. I seriously doubt that the organization would even put 2 and 2 together. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primadonna22274 Posted July 4, 2015 Share Posted July 4, 2015 The problem is that information systems may have a flag on you, so even if you were to slip through the cracks and get to a rotation if you were flagged by IS when they tried to set up access it might be a cluster. The very most important thing NOW is that you talk with your clinical coordinator about this potential problems and head it off before YOU become a problem nobody wants to deal with. Be proactive now--it will be worth it. Good luck. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nonlegit Posted July 5, 2015 Share Posted July 5, 2015 Wow we use Epic and I have never heard of this problem before. Crazy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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